Archive
for
November 2013

Reuse and repurpose: reclaiming your decorating style isn't as hard as you think. Consider integrating upcycled goods, like these sturdy woven baskets made from rubber tires by HomArt, into your interior design.

Reclaimed tire baskets are both fun and functional. These multi-purpose containers save tires from landfills and you from years of endless clutter. Fill them with toys, use them as wastebaskets or laundry hampers, or even drag them into the garden. These baskets, which come in subtle shades of black and gray - are the combination of beauty and utility. They fit well in a rustic setting, or can provide a striking contrast in a traditional or modern home decor.

Singapore-based designer Nathan Yong created a four poster bed unlike anything we've ever seen before. The Casetta in Canada bed is a four poster bed shaped like a house. The bed is made from white-painted ash wood and can be accented with drapes.

Yong was inspired by the house he lived in when he was a kid. "I stay[ed] in a wooden house like a cabin, and me and my siblings would even climb onto the roof top to explore our environment. By having a bed that look like an archetype house within a room, it blurred our concept of indoor and outdoor and suggest our curiousness [sic] and exploration of our environment."

Yong described his design process:

"I like my design to evoke a sense of wonder and bring a smile to those who observe and use them, conveying the idea that lies behind their creation ... Most of my projects start with an operation of stripping, due to the need to make the function, the material, the method and the result as comprehensible as possible, retaining its authenticity of its objective." Yong further explained that his works are like "silent engineering," where "the form [is allowed] to express itself, based on technical considerations, not just as a graphic scheme."

The house-shaped Casetta in Canada bed is available from Mogg, an Italian furniture company started by architect Nicola Galbiati. The company specializes in modern furnitures with clean lines and minimalist styles.

Thanksgiving is almost here, but that's no reason to panic: there's still plenty of time to craft the perfect Thanksgiving dining experience. Turkey aside, you can add to the joy of Thanksgiving with a little DIY decor.

Here are 10 Easy Last-Minute Thanksgiving Centerpieces you can do yourself:

1. Fall-Inspired Glass Cloche Centerpiece

Better Homes and Gardens featured this simple yet wonderful fall-inspired glass cloche centerpiece. Use a bell jar (a terrarium or a glass cake cover will do, if you don't have a bell jar handy) and a shallow terra-cota bulb dish to create your own display. Mini pumpkins, leaves, and apple or two serve as the fall-inspired decor inside.

2. Candles in a Log

What's better than a centerpiece that takes 5 minutes to make? How about one that takes 5 minutes to make and is free? Jenna Burger of SAS Interiors took a cut tree branch and drilled six 1-1/2" holes about 10" apart in the log. Next, she filled the holes with tea candles and voilà - the centerpiece is ready! Add some mini pumpkins, pine cones and leaves as decorations and you're done! View the DIY instructions over at SAS Interiors

Living wall is a great alternative to cement block retaining wall - and if done well, it can be the focal point of a garden as well.

The Natural History Museum in Los Angeles, California, has transformed its asphalt parking lot and reclaimed the three-and-a-half acre land as a nature's garden. The green space includes a walkway where visitors can take a leisurely stroll and admire the plants and wildlife - a particularly rare treat in the urban environment of Los Angeles.

Bordering the walkway is the museum's Living Wall, which is constructed from vertical spears of stones that are installed vertically - at a slightly random and haphazard angles - leaving cracks between the individual shards for spaces to plant succulents and other plants. The wall is made from 3.2 million pounds of Pritchard Flagstone, a colorful sedimentary rock with bluish gray, tan, and rusty colors.

How do literary heavyweights stack against one another? Does one War
and Peace by Leo Tolstoy, which comes in at a hefty 1,225 pages,
outweigh James Joyce's tour de force Ulysses, which runs into
about 1,000 pages? The Balance Bookshelf will be the judge of that!

Interior designer Chris
Cushingham's Balance Bookshelf is a wall-mounted bookshelf that lets
you display your books unlike any other bookshelves. The idea is simple:
put the books you've read on one side of the scale and your collection
of unread books on the other. The Balance Bookshelf "helps you visualize
your stack of read books vs. unread books," Cushingham wrote on his
Etsy
page and added, "motivation to get some reading done."

Sieger Design designed a shower system called Sensory Sky for German manufacturer Dornbracht. Users can select from three preset shower profiles or "choreographies" to match their mood - or create their own scenario for the ultimate in water relaxation.

Can a swimming pool slide be a sculptural piece as well? Miles Hartwell and Matt Withington of UK design studio SplinterWorks thought it could, so they set forth to design the Shoot pool slide.

The Shoot pool slide looks impossible. The 1.8 m (almost 6 foot) tall structure "shoots" out of the side of the pool like a huge arch that abruptly ends before it hits the water. The slide starts out narrow then flares out in thicker section which creates a seemingly unbalanced mass. Alternating bursts provide footholds to climb the slide, and the edge of the slide itself curls inwards to provide the handrail.

Structurally, the Shoot pool slide is made possible by the steel foundation that anchors it firmly onto the side of the pool. Strong yet light carbon fibers compose the body, which is then covered in silver foil to complement the glistening pool water below.

These ARE the Star Wars-inspired furniture you've been looking for! If you're a Star Wars lovers looking to decorate your home with desks, beds, chairs, coffee tables inspired by the sci-fi series, you've come to the right place. From the amazing creations of Tom Spina and his crew over at Tom Spina Designs (The Force is strong with them - many of their creations have gone viral on the Web) to talented DIYers building their own furnishings, let's take a look at 20 pieces of the Best Star Wars Furniture that Imperial Credits Can Buy.

2. Death Star Wall Tiles

That's no moon! When his client wanted a sci-fi inspired custom home theater, artist and designer Victor Brown (Facebook page) fully realized the power of the Dark Side with this Death Star Home Theater. Brown collaborated with Tom Spina Designs to craft wall tiles that will remind any Star Wars fan of the Death Star Trench run scene from Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope.

A total of 120 Death Star tiles were installed under the home theater's screen and along the lower walls and steps.

Many houses use wood, but not like this "Jenga House." Award-winning Japanese architect Sou Fujimoto uses large cedar blocks to create an unusual yet functional home overlooking the River Kuma in Kumakura village, Japan.

In traditional architecture, Fujimoto told ArchDaily, lumber is very versatile - it is used as columns, beams, walls, floorings, and so on. So why not design a house using the simple building unit of 35 cm (about 13-3/4") wide cedar blocks - with all the functionalities built in?

Designed in 2005 and built in 2008, Fujimoto's Final Wooden House is constructed in a very small space, just 15.1 m2 (162 square feet). And it looks like it's a giant Jenga blocks: the large beams seem to protrude haphazardly here and there, but there's actually logic to the madness.

"There are no separation of floor, wall, and ceiling here. A place that one thought was a floor becomes a chair, a ceiling, a wall from various positions. The floor levels are relative and spatially is perceived differently according to one's position. Here, people are distributed three-dimensionally in the space. This is a place like an amorphous landscape with a new experience of various senses of distances," Fujimoto added.

Spaces between the blocks in the wall become windows enclosed in glass, and spaces on the ceiling becomes skylights.

The Horizontal Shower solves the age old question of combining the relaxing act of taking a hot shower with lying down for a cozy nap. It is, according to German manufacturer Dornbrach, the next step of the evolution in the bathroom and it's easy to see why.

Designed by Sieger Design, with interior design Scienbein + Pier, the Horizontal Shower includes six separate shower heads that produce six different "water bars" over a reclining space. These water jets can be programmed to give a range of water temperature, intensity, and quantity. The user can choose various settings - which Dornbracht has called "choreographies," that's designed to provide balancing, energizing, or de-stressing effects.

The Horizontal Shower comes with a recessed control panel called the eTOOL which allows the user to select his or her own favorite shower experience, as well as an optional handheld shower for a quick, targeted blast.